BRING ME THE HORIZON Drummer On New Album 'Amo': 'We Made A Conscious Effort To Experiment'

BRING ME THE HORIZON drummer Matt Nicholls recently spoke with Australia's Heavy magazine. The full conversation can be streamed below. A few excerpts follow (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On the group's new album, "Amo":

Matt: "I think this record, we didn't really make a conscious effort to make an album full of bangers. With [2015's] 'That's The Spirit', I think we had our hearts set on just making an album full of single-worthy tracks — what we thought would be singles. With this one, I think we just kind of entered the studio and [did] what we wanted to do, and just take from [different] directions and do fun stuff. [It was] more about what we wanted to make as opposed to what we thought people would want to hear. This one, I think, we made a conscious effort to experiment a little bit more."

On the album's electronic influence:

Matt: "The band's always enjoyed making music with electronic elements. We're fans of that kind of music and stuff like that. We don't want to limit ourselves. I think there's only so far you can take guitar, drum and bass. When Jordan [Fish, keyboards/programming] came into the band, it just opened up a whole new world as fans and stuff you can do with your music. It doesn't pigeonhole you as just a rock band — you can take it to wherever you want to take it. You can have whatever sound you want, whether it be, like, orchestral strings or whether it be, like, dance synths and stuff. For us, we like that kind of stuff, and we didn't want to just limit ourselves — 'This is our sound; this is what we want to do.' So many bands find a comfort zone, and they get their sound and they're kind of scared to take that leap into doing something different. We're not scared to do that — we're confident enough in ourselves and believe in ourselves to be able to do stuff like that."

On the band's writing process:

Matt: "It's just whatever comes out. If we think it sounds good, then we'll work with it, and we'll work on it and see where it goes. A lot of songs start off sounding one way and then take a different direction. It just comes out like that, and if it sounds good, we'll use it. We're not scared to try different [things]. If we like it, it gets used."

On receiving positive feedback from fans:

Matt: "It's good when people relate to what you're doing. I think we've got pretty loyal fans and pretty dedicated fans, and I hope that they all feel like they connect to every song on a certain level — not necessarily just one. We're fans of music still, even though we're in this band. People forget that. It's good whenever anyone can relate to it."

On choosing the title "Amo", and whether the record is conceptual:

Matt: "It's not necessarily a concept record. I guess there's a little underlying theme for every song... Oli's [Sykes] wife is Brazilian, and they speak Portuguese in Brazil, so it definitely comes from that. ['Amo' is Portuguese for 'I love.'] He's had a hard time over the past few years, and he's really happy now. I've never seen him this happy. He's been through a lot, and he's come out the other side better for it, and he's just feeling good."

On the guest appearance by Dani Filth (CRADLE OF FILTH) on the song "Wonderful Life":

Matt: "We had this bit in the song [and] we thought it'd sound good if it had this, like, spooky, kind of metally voice. He was really up for it."

On the band's reluctance to perform material from their early records in concert:

Matt: "To be honest, we don't really play songs from the first two records. We've got better songs... We don't really like that sort of music anymore, especially the first record, but they're a part of the band, and it's part of the band's history. It's cool we've got that many songs... that we can pick and choose from. It's weird — the songs kind of pick themselves. You can kind of tell which ones are going to work live, and which ones are going to be good — which ones the fans are going to enjoy."

BRING ME THE HORIZON recently released a new song called "Medicine", along with an accompanying music video. It follows "Mantra", which has reached No. 7 on the active rock radio chart.

"Amo" will be released on January 25 via Columbia Records, with the group kicking off a North American tour on January 23 in Nashville.

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